to the world, for some reeds which sprung up from the spot
murmured incessantly, as they waved to and fro in the wind: "King Midas has
the ears of an ass."

In the sad and beautiful story of Niobe, daughter of Tantalus, and wife of
Amphion, king of Thebes, we have another instance of the severe punishments
meted out by Apollo to those who in any way incurred his displeasure. Niobe
was the proud mother of seven sons and seven daughters, and exulting in the
number of her children, she, upon one occasion, ridiculed the worship of
Leto, {80} because she had but one son and daughter, and desired the
Thebans, for the future, to give to her the honours and sacrifices which
they had hitherto offered to the mother of Apollo and Artemis. The
sacrilegious words had scarcely passed her lips before Apollo called upon
his sister Artemis to assist him in avenging the insult offered to their
mother, and soon their invisible arrows sped through the air. Apollo slew
all the sons, and Artemis had already slain all the daughters save one, the
youngest and best beloved, whom Niobe clasped in her arms, when the
agonized mother implored the enraged deities to leave her, at least, one
out of all her beautiful children; but, even as she prayed, the deadly
arrow reached the heart of this child also. Meanwhile the unhappy father,
unable to bear the loss of his children, had destroyed himself, and his
dead body lay beside the lifeless corpse of his favourite son. Widowed and
childless, the heart-broken mother sat among her dead, and the gods, in
pity for her unutterable woe, turned her into a stone, which they
transferred to Siphylus, her native Phrygian mountain, where it still
continues to shed tears.

[Illustration]

The punishment of Niobe forms the subject of a magnificent marble group,
which was found at Rome in the year 1553, and is now in the gallery of
Uffizi, at Florence.

The renowned singer Orpheus was the son of Apollo and Calliope, the muse of
epic poetry, and, as might be expected with parents so highly gifted, was
endowed with most distinguished intellectual qualifications. He was a poet,
a teacher of the religious doctrines known as the Orphic mysteries, and a
great musician, having inherited from his father an extraordinary genius
for music. {81} When he sang to the sweet tones of his lyre, he charmed all
nature, and summoned round him the wild beasts of the forests, who, under
the influence of his music, became tame and gent